Add Doors To Your Cheap Media Centre For A Cleaner Look

We’ve featured a few ways to build a cheap entertainment centre before, but oftentimes these solutions are too open, displaying all your bulky gear and cables. Here’s how to clean things up by adding some doors, while still keeping it all functional.

Using other units for media centres can save you quite a bit of cash, but they don’t always look quite as good. They’re either open (like a bookshelf) or they come with drawers, which are less than ideal for a home theatre set-up. DIYer Mitch took his IKEA set of drawers and converted them into cupboards instead, keeping the receivers nicely hidden while still saving a good $US100 over most closed media centres. All you need to do is separate the front of the drawer and add some hinges, and you’ve got yourself a perfectly working media centre. It seems obvious, but will save you quite a bit of money with minimal work.

Furthermore, he’s augmented his set-up by keeping the backs open to help airflow, and using an infrared repeater for his remote control. That way, he doesn’t need to open the doors every time he watches TV (thus completely defeating the purpose of installing the doors in the first place). It’s a pretty good way to save money by using non-media centre units without it looking cheap. Hit the link for more information, and share your media centre tips in the comments.

i was considering doing something similar when i get around to assembling a HTPC. Initial plans were to build an entirley custom low-line tv unit to house my HTPC and 4 consoles, and add in-built computer case fans to extract hot air etc, but i'm no electronics whiz, so i had no idea how i would power these fans, and the idea kinda fizzled.

Just use a multi voltage ac adaptor like you get to power your calculater/dymo printer. Has to output DC voltage and get something that outputs at 500ma for a few fans.
This is how I had the fans in my cabinet powered. Just used normal PC 12v fans. Then you can change the voltage to change the speed too... ;)